A federal judge has dramatically raised the stakes of an upcoming hearing on alleged misconduct by porn copyright trolling firm Prenda Law. The hearing, scheduled for Monday in Los Angeles, was originally slated to focus on the actions of Prenda attorney Brett Gibbs. But in documents filed last month, Gibbs denied wrongdoing, blaming all of his alleged misconduct on his superiors. So on Tuesday, US District Judge Otis Wright ordered seven additional people connected to Prenda to report to his courtroom and explain themselves.

More precisely, Wright expanded Monday's hearing to include six more real people and one person who may not exist. A Minnesota man named Alan Cooper has accused Prenda of naming him the CEO of a litigious shell company called AF Holdings. Prenda insists Cooper's allegations are false, so Judge Wright has ordered both Alan Coopers to appear in his courtroom next Monday. Now, Prenda's senior officials will either have to produce a second Alan Cooper or explain to Judge Wright, in person, why they were unable to do so.

A terrible soap opera

Some television dramas have complex plots involving so many characters that fans have created elaborate charts to keep the characters and their relationships straight. Defense attorney Morgan Pietz was experiencing a similar difficulty keeping track of all the entities affiliated with Prenda Law, so he created an elaborate chart and filed it as an exhibit to a Monday legal filing:

The "characters" in the Prenda soap opera are listed in the upper left. John Steele and Paul Hansmeier originally founded a law firm called Steele and Hansmeier. According to Gibbs, the firm sold its book of business to a new firm called Prenda Law in 2011. A lawyer named Paul Duffy is nominally the principal of Prenda, but critics say Steele and Hansmeier are still secretly pulling Prenda's strings.

An operative named Mark Lutz has been named as an official in a variety of Prenda-related companies. In November, a Florida federal judge blasted him for "attempted fraud on the court," for claiming to represent a pornography producer when he was unable to even name the porn company's officers. More recently, Gibbs named Lutz as a successor to "Alan Cooper," the CEO of the shell companies AF Holdings and Ingenuity 13.

Someone named "Salt Marsh" has been named in corporate documents as an officer of AF Holdings. Pietz has suggested that this is not a real person, but rather a reference to Anthony Saltmarsh, the "live-in boyfriend" of John Steele's sister Jayme.

In Pietz's view, the fact that so many Prenda "clients" are all staffed by the same handful of individuals with close ties to Steele or Hansmeier is evidence that they are not independent entities at all. Rather, the proliferation of shell companies is, well, a shell game, designed to shield Prenda's real principals from accountability for their ethically questionable activities.

Judge Wright has ordered seven of the nine individuals on Pietz's chart, including the possibly imaginary Alan Cooper, to report to his courtroom on Monday. These include Duffy and Steele, who recently filed defamation lawsuits against their online critics. Having all of Prenda's senior officials in one room will make it much easier for Wright to get straight answers to his questions.

But Brett Gibbs, who was originally slated to face Judge Wright alone at Monday's hearing, likely won't be singing from Prenda's hymnal. As the chart above indicates, Gibbs has been heavily involved in Prenda's business activities for years. But last month, he lawyered up and began blaming his actions on his superiors at Prenda. In a Monday filing, he stated that "I no longer have a relationship with Prenda Law."

He didn't elaborate on whether Prenda fired him or whether he made a strategic decision to put as much distance as possible between himself and the troubled firm.

Your Honor, let's go for broke on this one... plaintiff pays the Does' costs, and how about something punitive thrown in? There's no lesson learned if it's only Malibu's time and resources that are wasted; how about dipping into their pocketbook?

You're likely to get a couple of the people there, but a whole bunch of "I'm sorry your honor; we were unable to contact those guys on short notice." type excuses.

Maybe, maybe not. The judge is obviously at the end of his patience for Prenda Law. He might not tolerate further delays without very good reasons.

And what can Prenda Law do? At most they'll be able to delay the requirement that the people show up, but they will have to at some point. If they directly disobey the judge's orders... well, they're going to be in a world of judicial pain.

Quite entertaining in a train wreck sort of way. I'm looking forward to Ars's continued coverage on this. Also, I somehow believe the line of questioning will sound a lot like Abbott and Costello's "Who's on First?".

In the best of all possible worlds, the judge would have eleventy-seven FBI agents and US Marshals waiting in the wings. He'd yell for half an hour or more and then, with great aplomb and nationally televised coverage on all networks, any of the seven who actually show up would immediately be moved from their salt marshes to a salt mine. (Warrants would be issued for those who don't show up, and "most wanted" posters placed in post offices, schools, bars, movie houses, and on milk cartons.) Of course, this is not that world so the best to hope for, realistically, may be the yelling. I sure hope there's yelling, and then some.

You're likely to get a couple of the people there, but a whole bunch of "I'm sorry your honor; we were unable to contact those guys on short notice." type excuses.

Maybe, maybe not. The judge is obviously at the end of his patience for Prenda Law. He might not tolerate further delays without very good reasons.

And what can Prenda Law do? At most they'll be able to delay the requirement that the people show up, but they will have to at some point. If they directly disobey the judge's orders... well, they're going to be in a world of judicial pain.

This. I mean, it's entirely possible that they'll not show up for the hearing. They've certainly made a whole bunch of really bad calls in the last several months, when they could have just walked away from it all and probably not reached this point of no return. But if they don't show up, we're talking some bad stuff happening to them.

3 guesses that they all show up and claim it's this "Saltmarsh" guy who ran everything, but they don't know where he is. And then the judge gets angry.

As a practicing attorney I have mixed feelings about this whole sordid mess.First, I wish that every case that crossed my desk could devolve into a complicated web of deceit and shadow dealings (and that my clients were in a position to pay me to sort through the mess).But while I love watching the antics of "Attorneys Gone Wild" I wish that there was more substantial coverage of attorney's good work. For example, a profile of Mr. Pietz and his efforts to protect his clients from copyright trolls.

The judge has just done the legal equivalent of a shell game player putting his finger down on the middle shell and saying "the ball is under THIS shell, so flip up the other two to show me they're empty."

As this Prenda Law soap opera unfolds, I keep seeing a new infraction flaring up - what started as an action to stop a troll-firm from harassing him, this has ballooned into securities fraud, legal fraud on the court, frivolous and harassing lawsuit claims, potentially perjury and more. Generally I would say lawyers in the position of those at Prenda Law are savvy enough to know not to co-mingle personal and business funds - I cannot, by virtue of rational thought, assert that presumption. These attorneys have shown such blatant disregard for the corporate structure and the laws that they purportedly are sworn to upkeep and follow that I feel safe to assume their funds and the corporate funds are one in the same. What this creates is a clear avenue for a court to ignore the corporate identity and impose personal liability for any punitive damage judgments rendered and for any fines levied by the SEC or any other federal agency who may be interested in making the news for their enforcement efforts.

In law school they would have us read these outlandish cases which only leaving you scratching your head wondering "Who would even try and do this?" The whole purpose is to demonstrate exactly what not to do. Prenda Law so far has unfolded to be a Business Organization professor's dream case. It its filled with wrongs and more wrongs and is a prime example of the "If you want to succeed, don't do this" form of teaching.

In law school they would have us read these outlandish cases which only leaving you scratching your head wondering "Who would even try and do this?" The whole purpose is to demonstrate exactly what not to do. Prenda Law so far has unfolded to be a Business Organization professor's dream case. It its filled with wrongs and more wrongs and is a prime example of the "If you want to succeed, don't do this" form of teaching.

As a practicing attorney I have mixed feelings about this whole sordid mess.First, I wish that every case that crossed my desk could devolve into a complicated web of deceit and shadow dealings (and that my clients were in a position to pay me to sort through the mess).But while I love watching the antics of "Attorneys Gone Wild" I wish that there was more substantial coverage of attorney's good work. For example, a profile of Mr. Pietz and his efforts to protect his clients from copyright trolls.

I'm giddy with anticipation as to how they'll try to explain away the whole debacle with Alan Cooper. Will they try and find some homeless person and just pick them off the streets to make them the new CEO? Maybe Eddie Murphy would fit the bill?

What I want to see is if there's going to be one or two Coopers in that court room, and if there's only one, hear Prenda's explanation as to why that is the case... That'd be worth a lul or two for sure.

To have been a fly on the wall when those Prenda guys decided it'd be a great idea to make up a fictional character to run a company and steal the identity of an existing person, associated with one of the involved lawyers no less... What were their thoughts and reasons behind all this? How did they expect to get away with it? What did they hope they'd gain from it?`

The judge has just done the legal equivalent of a shell game player putting his finger down on the middle shell and saying "the ball is under THIS shell, so flip up the other two to show me they're empty."

Off topic, but this a pet peeve of mine: Don't think you can win in any way at shell or 3 card monty: even watching the game is getting caught: most of the time, there are pickpockets hitting the crowd. I leave it to your leisure to google it and find out but there is an especially good interactive video on youtube demonstrating that there is absolutely no reason for them to let you win in any way, shape, or form.

What I want to see is if there's going to be one or two Coopers in that court room, and if there's only one, hear Prenda's explanation as to why that is the case... That'd be worth a lul or two for sure.

To have been a fly on the wall when those Prenda guys decided it'd be a great idea to make up a fictional character to run a company and steal the identity of an existing person, associated with one of the involved lawyers no less... What were their thoughts and reasons behind all this? How did they expect to get away with it? What did they hope they'd gain from it?`

It's so nuts it just boggles my mind entirely.

If there WERE a second Alan Cooper, there is no logical reason not to bring him forward IMMEDIATELY vs risking your career. There is no explanation for their delay.

Timothy B. Lee / Timothy covers tech policy for Ars, with a particular focus on patent and copyright law, privacy, free speech, and open government. His writing has appeared in Slate, Reason, Wired, and the New York Times.